Purosol Optical

Does anyone know what is in the Purosol Optical Lens Cleaner?

I have found many various brands of optical cleaning solutions and they claim to be derived from Plant Enzymes. My suspicion is that many folks are paying $15 for a 1 oz. Bottle of a Methanol Mixture.

It is available under a few different names and I saw 2 oz bottles for as little as $3.49. It virtually has to be available in a generic ($3.49) because of the age of the product patent. It is not Methanol, which is available under a few different names such as Shellac Thinner, Ditto fluid (if you can remember that), denatured alcohol (which can be made from Ethanol tainted with Methanol). Ethanol is what is in drinking alcohol, i.e. whiskey. You can get Ethanol in a virtual pure state with what is called 190% straight grain alcohol.

You might want to read this site on lens cleaning:

http://photo.net/learn/cleaning-cameras

It states, however, that Kodak Lens cleaner appeared to be only diluted Ammonia, but I have this urge not to believe that totally since if he had ammonia in it, it would have an odor which I have not ever detected. Virtually every photographer with more than 25 years of experience has used the Kodak product, but it is no longer available.

The site also recommends Zeiss lens cleaner, but their lens cleaning pads (paper soaked with Zeiss lens cleaner) ,availabe in individually wrapped foil containers, seems to be little more than isopropyl alcohol, the rubbing alcohol that your purchase from a drug store.

If you want to feel secure, use purosol, but as far as I can see, it is made with Ethlene Glycol, automobile antifreeze, which would indicate to me that it at least has an alcohol in it.

They say that Purosol is made from organic materials, so is alcohol, both wood alcohol (Methanol) and Ethanol. Both can be made from corn, thus the Methanol in gasoline and the Ethanol in some liquors. They can separated, however, using a variety of methods.

I would also recommend that you look up Origin Labs, the manufacturer of Purosol, and see what they have to say. I would say that it is safe on lenses, however.